Sure, there's plenty making 500K per year but they're not going to just come out and share their methods. SEO/IM is a billion dollar business/industry so I'll let you decided if you think there's people making that much per year.

Not me. Having said that - if you set the bar at say 200,000 a year I bet there would be a fair number. From the meetings I go to and the SEO guys I speak to, many seem to earn between 200 and 300k - seems a huge drop off after that.

However, I can think of good reasons why this figure is a lot lower than your 500k opening question.

Scaling is an issue. Once I get to a certain figure, I need to scale, that normally means employing people, getting premises and going "legit". So though I might be making 500k or more, I'm not BH any more and don't visit this site

Next is just secrecy. People won't tell you anywhere, anyhow.

End of the day if you earn $1500 a day then you've probably gone past the value point of this forum. You want advice about hiring and firing, developing SERIOUS software maybe, getting your own office whatever - or just off enjoying yourself spending it if you've scaled up well with few overheads.

That is ridiculous! Do not listen to this guy/girl/Neophyte. There are plenty of reasons why WE use this forum. I use it for many things such as evaluating G's next big push. If something gets too hot here G will fix it on the front end. I also use it for integrating new techniques and for trial purposes. I, like a few others also enjoy helping other sites make it and in the end it helps build connections.

Not me. Having said that - if you set the bar at say 200,000 a year I bet there would be a fair number. From the meetings I go to and the SEO guys I speak to, many seem to earn between 200 and 300k - seems a huge drop off after that.

However, I can think of good reasons why this figure is a lot lower than your 500k opening question.

Scaling is an issue. Once I get to a certain figure, I need to scale, that normally means employing people, getting premises and going "legit". So though I might be making 500k or more, I'm not BH any more and don't visit this site

Next is just secrecy. People won't tell you anywhere, anyhow.

End of the day if you earn $1500 a day then you've probably gone past the value point of this forum. You want advice about hiring and firing, developing SERIOUS software maybe, getting your own office whatever - or just off enjoying yourself spending it if you've scaled up well with few overheads.

The problem with that question, OP, is that anyone who answers in the affirmative is almost definitely not telling the truth and therefore is of no use to you, whilst those who should be answering in the affirmative choose not to answer at all, also being of no use to you

So I hate to point it out, but either way, the response or non-response to your question is of no use to you!

I think Scritty is about as right as one can be on the matter... I think BHW is in the most part quite useful for people who are operationally actually doing SEO. If you're running a business, whether IM or other, with a nett of >$500k/yr chances are you're not spending much time on operational tasks, and if by chance you are, you're certainly getting close to the ceiling of your earning ability under that operating model.

That said, on my current figures I could do around $1.6m nett/yr as a 'one man operation' with the few virtual staff I have now. I'm not doing that, but that's my maximum operating capacity under my current model with no 'real' employees or 'legit' operation. Beyond that, one moves into a totally different operating model, with middle management and segregated business units and staff with stand-alone roles, and then you go through that horrible phase of having all the 'big business expenses' like management and significant other fixed overhead, without having the 'big business revenue' because you haven't yet built it because you haven't, until that point, been able to operationally deliver the volume of service/widgets that's required to get that revenue - and it's that transition period where most die... To move through that phase fast requires razor-sharp planning and execution, and plenty of capital, and if I were to theorize on what specifically causes failures 'generally' in that phase, it would be business owners/managers over-estimating their ability to execute their plan, and under-estimating their cash burn. And, realizing this isn't a Wharton school MBA forum, I'll stop my rambling now

Note that adblockers might block our captcha, and other functionality on BHW so if you don't see the captcha or see reduced functionality please disable adblockers to ensure full functionality, note we only allow relevant management verified ads on BHW.